


The Mockingjay and Moonlight

by ikikiuru



Category: Hunger Games Trilogy - Suzanne Collins
Genre: Alternate Universe - Fantasy, Cursed!Katniss, F/M, Human!Buttercup, Other Additional Tags to Be Added, Witchcraft, Work In Progress
Language: English
Status: In-Progress
Published: 2018-10-22
Updated: 2018-10-22
Packaged: 2019-08-06 03:13:31
Rating: Not Rated
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,589
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/16380329
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/ikikiuru/pseuds/ikikiuru
Summary: Fairytale inspired fantasy AU: heroine with a memory loss, benevolent merpeople, cat that is forced to assume a human form and a prince that (tries to) save the day!The summary will be edited when I have more than the skeleton of the story to go by.





	The Mockingjay and Moonlight

Prologue

Once upon a time there was a moving carnival, that travelled east and west, north and south, and every direction in between. Indeed, the carnival visited nearly every corner of the world in its never ending tour, and for the people who visited it, its arrival was very well the highlight of the year.

One of the performers in the carnival was a singer and an accordion player, whose voice was said to be the most beautiful a mortal man was ever bestowed upon, and people came from far and wide to hear him sing and play. This singer and his wife were blessed with two lovely daughters, the younger was like sunlight and sea foam, whereas the older, with her raven hair and silver eyes, was said to be the image of the goddess Moon herself.

The girls' father sang during the day and long into the evening as was his job, while his wife worked as a healer for all the kind yet eccentric people of their big carnival family. But the father loved to sing so much, and his family loved to hear him sing even more, that he woke his daughters with a song, sang when when the family was doing chores or spending time together in the evening and even during mealtimes, and he tucked the little girls in bed with a lullaby. And so his family knew all his songs by heart.

It so happened, that one year while the carnival was in the Northern leg of its tour, little Primrose caught a summer flu and could do nothing but rest in bed. She was still such a small and frail little girl that her mother was afraid the sickness would be fatal, and so she devoted all her time to nurse her back to health. Because of this, little Katniss had to go with her father during the day. Katniss didn't mind this, since she loved her father and little sister and hoped she would get better soon. But she was a shy girl and afraid of strangers, so she hid behind her father while he was performing.

Still, before long she became too curious of what kind of people came to listen to her father sing, for she had heard of the noble people with their fine clothes, and the brave people with many stories of their adventures, and even the shady people who would sometimes be so moved of her fathers song they would reward him with the most curious of treasures. So, little Katniss started peeking from her hiding spot into the crowd. She became so fascinated with these observations indeed that she forgot to keep herself hidden, and before long someone spotted silver eyes of a pretty little girl peeking from behind her father.

"Is this your daughter, mister singer? Can you sing like your father, lovely?"

Katniss had never sung to anyone outside her family. In fact, she had never sung alone, since she always sang with her father, but as she was about to shake her head and dive back into the safety of her hiding place, she set her sight to the bluest eyes she had ever seen, the blue of the burnt midsummer sky. The owner of those eyes, a boy little older than herself, smiled kindly to her, and although she felt shy, she suddenly had the courage to sing for an audience. She took her place in front of her father, thought of all the songs he had sung to her, picked her favorite and started to sing. And as she opened her mouth and the first notes escaped her lips, the whole world was rendered silent. If her father's voice was the most beautiful ever bestowed upon a mortal man, hers was that of the goddess that had the power to make such gifts. But as the people listening were so amazed and stayed speechless even after the song had ended, poor Katniss thought she had done something wrong and embarrassed herself, so she fled the stage and hid in the wardrobe storing all the entertainers' and performers' outfits.

She was crying because of her embarrassment when she heard someone else moving between the rows of velvets and satins and sequins, and soon she saw the same blue eyes that gave her courage earlier. Now they were worried yet curious as he took in their hideout.

"These are all so very sparkly", he said in a conversational tone.

Katniss just blinked.

They were quiet for a moment before he tried again.

"Why did you run away?"

Katniss, who had stopped crying when the boy appeared, felt the tears start swelling up again.

"I shouldn't have sang", she cried, "I embarrassed myself and my father. He must be ashamed of me now."

The boy stared at her, puzzled.

"You were amazing", he said earnestly. "Even the birds stopped to listen."

Katniss looked at him doubtfully.

"Really?", she asked in a quivering voice. 

The boy smiled brightly and nodded encouragingly.

"My name is Peeta", he said and offered her his hand. "What is yours?"

"Katniss", she said shyly and took his hand.

Peeta smiled even brighter and drew her out of the rows of clothes.

"Let's get back to your father, I'm sure he is worries. I know my father is every time I leave and not tell where I'm going. And I bet all the people want to hear you sing again."

And so Katniss started to sing for the people with her father, and she and Peeta became fast friends. The carnival went on moving from place to place, but every year in that same place Peeta came to the carnival and spend the whole time it stayed with Katniss, and every year they grew even closer. As did Peeta's feelings for Katniss, for though he hadn't told anyone, the moment he had first heard her sing, he had decided he would one day marry this girls with angelic voice.

Then came the year Katniss and her family were invited to come live in the castle and perform in the court. The Queen had heard of the enchanted voice that enraptured the carnival goers, and wished to witness this spectacle. Though the Everdeens' loved their moving home and their carnival family, they gatefully accepted the offer, for the parents thought that the stable life in the castle would be better for the girls, and that way they could put them to a real school.

Everyone in the carnival was sad to see the Everdeens leave, but they wanted to wish them well in their new life in the castle. So, when the last day of the Everdeens' carnival life arrived, they closed their gates to the usual visitors to have a grand farewell party. The day and the following night were full of music, laughter and all kinds of merrymaking. All sorts of foods were prepared, foreign and homely, and there were wide array of drinks to enjoy, from wine and beer that some of the adults preferred, to sweet teas and refreshing lemonade that was a favorite among children.

It didn't take long that Katniss, who preferred peace and quiet, became overwhelmed by all the flurry and whirl, and sought a quiet place to have a moment for herself. She didn't tell anyone she was going to step out, a fateful oversight, for when people noticed she was missing, nobody knew where she had gone and for how long. And as it is in such northern regions, the night didn't draw its thick veil of darkness over the festivities, as it was the night of summer solstice, and so it was already quite late when people realized she was gone. Not surprisingly, it was young Peeta, who had been playing with little Primrose, who first started missing her. He circled the carnival grounds once, twice, and then a third time, and checked all their hiding spots and Katniss' favourite nooks, but when he didn't find her he became terribly worried. He alerted the grown ups, but at first they didn't think it was anything to worry about, for Katniss was known to hide when she wanted a moment of peace, but after they too had searched the premises once, twice, and a third time, everyone knew something was wrong. They expanded the search to the city, to the castle, and when they still couldn't find her, to the surrounding countryside. People from the city joined the search, the knights were dispatched to help, and a group of volunteers were gathered to search even the treacherous Forestland.

The search lasted for days, the carnival stayed behind its schedule, and everyone in the city started to keep an eye out for a raven-haired, moonlight-eyed little girl, but it seemed like she had vanished like last night's dream, like she never even had been there. Their spirits broken, the people went back to their daily lives. The carnival moved to its next destination. The Everdeens moved to the castle, for they felt it was safer place for little Primrose to grow up in. Time went on, and as people didn't dare speak about the young singer who seemed to have been spirited away, it appeared that she was mostly forgotten. Only the boy Peeta, who had been so close to have one of his most fervent dreams to come true, only to have it broken in such a cruel way, vowed that he wouldn't stop searching until he found his beloved Katniss.

**Author's Note:**

> This is my first fanfic in over fifteen years, and first ever to get further than 300 words, so please be merciful with me. Also, as I am new to fanfiction writing, I don't have a betareader, so I would like to ask if anyone is interested in betareading this story, or helping me to brainstorm the details. As it is, I only have a very, very bare skeleton of the story in my mind, there are a lot of characters that I haven't decided what to do with yet, and some of the characters have several possible placements, so if you want to speed up the process, let me know. I have a tumblr account that I haven't really used, but might start using for this, I set a new blog with the name ikikiuru, come say hi if you are interested!
> 
> That said, it will probably take a while before I can post anything else, so sorry for anyone who finds this interesting. I want to have everything planned out before I write the story further, but after I have done that, I believe that the writing itself won't take much longer. 
> 
> Also, if you like separated Everlark, I wan't to recommend Elsewhere by jennajuicebox. I just read it and love it, though as she has written for the fandom much longer, you probably have read her works, but I just wanted to mention this particularly because it is kind of similar but still very different.
> 
> Thanks for anyone that took the time to read my work, I am kind of terrified of the comments, but that is just my anxieties kicking in, so feel free to tell me what you think about this. I have never been an active social media -user, but I'll keep my eyes on tumblr if anyone is interested in lending a hand.


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